Warcraft: Angeline
by hannahshadowsong
Summary: Hannah and her friends, all in a normal reality like ours, perceive there to be much more to their old friend Rorres's stories about Ashenvale than they thought when unspoken visions and strange disappearings all point towards a much bigger truth. Rated M for upcoming smut.


Okay, so I haven't written for two years due to school and now that it's summer, I actually have time.

I wrote this story a while ago. My obsession over Warcraft lore still exists and I felt I wanted to publish my work.

The basis of this story is focused around the first person perspective of a girl and her friends, all in a normal reality like ours. In later chapters they end up traveling to Ashenvale and I imbedded them into different stories involving common Warcraft characters like Maiev Shadowsong, the Stormrage brothers, Tyrande Whisperwind, and many others... The first few chapters will consists of my introducing the characters and producing a little bit of a backstory for each of them, since I find it important, so please bear with me.

This is the first chapter. Enjoy.

-Intro

Perhaps it's the goal of people to be noticed; to be someone important. Someone that everyone greets with a placid smile and a glimmer of notice in their eyes. A breathing being that everyone will miss, should they disappear. One does envy the most popular of these folk: humans that light up the entire room when they enter, clad in happiness and reeking of positivity. Magic almost erupts from every word they speak, fooling anyone and everyone they meet. Anyone they speak to just about keels over in feigned gratitude, almost willing to worship them.

Damn those kinds of people, regardless of their intentions.

I never could comprehend nor appreciate positivity, since it never decided to don its grace upon my own life. No, I don't intend upon spending word after word on negative statements, or creating a "woe is me, and woe betide you" sort of novel. However I don't intend to tickle your ears with insincere gaiety. Reality is preferred to my own costs, reason being that one is allowed to murder everyone with reality.

Welcome, you've found hell.

Enjoy your fucking stay.

Chapter One: Blood & Insomnia

5:23 AM

"You should sleep."

"Shut up."

I crumpled another can and sent it aloft into a trash can.

"Not sleeping isn't going to bring them back…"

"Not sleeping will keep my head from trying to murder me."

I sat with my back to the wall, the window before me melting with rain.

My friend Tanner cleared aside his curly wreck of hair from his face and sighed. He joined me in watching the window, crossing his lanky legs as he sat. Two emerald irises adorned his face and glinted at the rain. He reeked of alcohol and laundry soap.

He entertained himself with picking at the holes in my jeans, not knowing what else to say. On other days he'd hug me close; today wasn't when I'd appreciate it.

Of course I wouldn't appreciate it: every single one of my damn friends had disappeared off the face of the fucking planet. No, they hadn't died, although I would've appreciated it more if I could see their lifeless bodies as opposed to knowing they were alive and no one knew where they were in this God-forsaken town. I would've much rather have been weeping over their deaths than ripping my conscience apart trying to figure out where they could've gone. The poorest kids in this town could not have possibly gone far. Unless they actually hitched a ride to the city and scrabbled up money for a train.

My friend sighed again, a little more aggravated than ten minutes ago. "Hannah."

"What"

"Let it go. They'll come back."

The back of my hand whipped across his face. He fell over and didn't move for a bit, slightly stunned.

"Shut up." I seethed

"Okay."

He rubbed the side of his face and stayed silent next to me.

Maybe it's stupid to be so stricken with their disappearance, but after spending all the life i remember with them… It meant much to me. They had helped me through so much and we were just a big crew of teenagers, all five of us, known mainly for being the poorest kids in this lot and being the raunchiest regarding behavior.

Tanner was one of those friends, being the only one still there. He was nineteen, and used to be one of the twenty children at the orphanage down the street. He was a genius, finished high school at fifteen, and moved in with Serena's family. She was gone too. Tanner had come over to my house earlier to avoid speaking with the police whom were searching Serena's room for any evidence of her disappearance. Not to mention he had also come over to drink himself sick.

My family never regulated who took the alcohol.

He took another swig of Vodka and giggled for a minute before staggering over to the bathroom.

I couldn't help but chuckle as he dumped his entire stomach into the toilet, cursing profusely between puking. I took a drink for myself, finishing the bottle before throwing it out the open window. The shattering of glass on the pavement outside was satisfying.

Tanner stumbled back next to me, hanging his head. "I want her back."

"i know you do. Shut it." I mumbled, popping open another bottle of alcohol.

"What's that?"

"Gin."

"Hand it this way."

He took the bottle from me and started downing it almost as quickly as I opened it.

I took it away from him when it was half empty. "You'll drink yourself to death, stupid."

"That's the point." He laughed, flopping over on his side like a deranged fish. "Sleeping here tonight."

"Do what you want." I yawned, "No sleep for me."

I poured the alcohol into a paper cup and downed it.

I gasped at how dizzy I became, keeling over next to Tanner and giving in to sleep.

I had insomnia for a reason.

Images of utter horror filled my mind, my conscience falling into deep sleep.

I found myself in a massive field. It was familiar to me.

I looked around blankly, shaking and shivering in abstinence of anything protecting me.

"Hannah!"

I wheeled around to find John, the shortest fellow of our crew. He was waving frantically, his clothes torn and his flesh no different underneath. His face bore the look of terror and his eyes kept darting around as if he was being chased.

Oh John. Johnny John. Asshole John. The little rascal of the group, with a heart of gold and a hot temper to match his fiery hair. Yellow spheres adorned his face for eyes, glittering like amber. He had given up trying to grow any taller than five feet, and was well known by the local police due to his constant thievery from the convenient stores. They never caught him, the boy was far too fast and too nimble. One could blink and he'd be gone, whether it be up a tree or down some gutter hole. No one could blame him for stealing: he had no parents and the ones who adopted him dumped him a week later saying he was stupid and they had no use for him. He refused to go to the orphanage and never got along with school. John couldn't stay in a seat longer than ten minutes before blowing something up into flames. Don't ask me how he did it. Being an arson seemed to dwell in his blood.

I ended up teaching him how to read and how to do simple math. He had a habit of keeping bags of pennies and nickels in his cardboard box that he lived in and didn't realize he had 1,112 dollars in coins and 64 cents until i taught him to count. He proceeded to spend it on pizza and alcohol for the next month.

Getting dumped on the streets was how we found him, huddled up on a cold corner dressed in a flurry of curses and ragged clothes. We tried keeping him in the basement of my house, but my "family" said they wouldn't have a "thief" in the house and threatened to call child support or some shit. We still kept him in our crew though; we gave him old clothes and we gave him food when we could. He stole when we couldn't provide him any, and would confess his sins at the local Catholic church every Saturday if he felt bad enough.

To sum it all up, boy had absolutely no fear, darting this way and that every chance we saw him.

But I'd never seen him like this, drenched with angst and bleeding like a gut pig.

"Hannah follow me! There's no time!" he whimpered, skittering away as blood dripped from his clothes.

I staggered after him as he fled into deep cave. I couldn't see a thing, but I knew that the ground was beneath my feet. Nothing more than that.

A door shut abruptly behind me.

"JOHN?"

No answer.

"JOHN. DON'T DO THIS. WHERE THE HELL ARE—"

"AWH WHAT A SWEETIE" Laughing erupted from all sides of the cave.

My stomach twisted itself into a ragged knot and curvatured into my spine at the voice i heard. And it wasn't John's.

"…Your voice is awfully ragged, John." I managed to force words out of my throat.

The laughing continued, bouncing off the sides of the cave and slamming into my head.

I stood there dumbstruck, wondering if it would be wise to start running or to attempt escaping out the shut door.

I sweated and fidgeted in my clothes, my eyes shut tight and my hands clenched at my sides. The laughing was getting coarser and much more.. closer.

"That wasn't John, sweetie."

I forced my eyes open, looked upwards, and screamed.

John hung from the ceiling, a chain threaded in his throat and spurted out the back. Blood fountained out of a hole in his stomach, intestines flopped out and pale.

A hand clamped around my neck and dragged me backwards as I started screaming.

"JOHN"

"He can't hear you."

"WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO"

"He's trying to bring you with us."

I stopped thrashing, panting and pulling at the hand around my throat. "What—" i coughed, "What the hell do you mean?!"

No answer. Only the shuffling of feet answered.

"ANSWER ME, DAMMIT. MY FRIENDS, THEY'RE GONE, FOR FUCKS SAKE—"

"I know. They're with me. And everyone else. But you won't be joining them anytime soon if I can help it."

I was beyond confused, ceasing my struggling to try and decipher what the hell was going on. Of course I was dreaming, but… if hell was real, I was feeling it right then and there. I couldn't feel pain, nor fear. Just confusion and anger intermingled into one massive explosive emotion. "FUCK YOU." I started up my screaming again, "WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY"

"You'll die if you try to find out. Stay home. Stay where people love you." The voice was blunt, but almost touching. As if this creature cared, in the slightest way.

I pulled the hand off my neck and scrambled away. "TELL ME WHERE THEY ARE." I was screaming now, while staggering along the dark flat. "WHY WOULD YOU KILL MY LITTLE BROTHER, HE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING." I was ready to cry over John's death. The sight of his body mangled and torn into utter shreds refused to exit my mind. Just a day ago I had seen him alive and kicking, fleeing down a street with a bag of stolen bread and throwing marbles behind him to hinder the cops chasing him. Just a day ago he sat next to me and drank himself sick before curling up in my arms and crying like a little child over our lost friends. Then he was gone too, without a word or a wisp.

"I didn't kill him. He's alive."

"You're not a very good liar you whore." I seethed, scooting away from him.

The creature speaking was male, I could tell that much. And extremely large. Breaths heaved out of his chest and two green globes glimmered where I assumed his face was. Claws of ivory dug into my throat as he clenched tighter, my struggles futile.

"i'll explain but I don't think you'll understand." he grumped. "I killed his presence. Not his body. They're both different. This isn't reality, sweetheart. This is your mind. Everyone has one. They all have something in common.. and it's that we all can live and die in them. In theory, anyway. I could kill you right now but you'd wake up back home perfectly well and whole."

I didn't care what his words meant, at the time. I didn't understand what he was talking about and I was yet confused and growing increasingly heartbroken over the loss of my little friend.

"..I don't understand.." I croaked, my voice blown out from screaming.

"..what else don't you understand, little one?"

"Where have my friends gone..? I need them back.."

He was silent.

I started sobbing like a little child, my face buried in my knees. "You don't understand.. I need my friends back.. I don't have a family, they're all I have.."

"You'll see them again, love. See you soon."

I suddenly awoke to Tanner shaking me.

"Hannah. Something's not right here."

"You're drunk. Go back to sleep."

"No! Hannah, shut up and listen— I just saw John."

I pushed him away. "Yeah, I did too. I don't know what the fuck—"

"Shh." Tanner suddenly covered my mouth with his hand. "Hear that?"

I looked around momentarily. "I don't— wait."

There was a light flutter of chatter outside the house, near the front door. Tanner was in a pounce-ready position, his neck bulging with veins. I'd never seen him like this before. His hair was plastered against his neck, his shirt torn and his breaths heavy, as if had been running. The bottle we drank out of earlier was smashed and covered in… blood?

"Tanner… what the hell did you do?"

"Saved our lives. Don't ask, just listen very carefully as to what I'm about to tell you. We don't have much time, and we have to act quickly."

I blinked and stared blankly at him, wondering how drunk we both were.

Tanner was indeed smart, and intelligent, but he rarely was as serious as he was at this very moment. He always hopped from job to job after getting bored, and would create quadratic equilibriums worth millions of dollars for absolutely no reason. He was always the fellow joking about how he'd be living in a cardboard box if he didn't get his life together, wearing jeans with holes as big as the Grand Canyon and flannels that hadn't been washed in a week and refusing to cut his unruly mass of hair. He'd smoke a joint in front of a cop just to piss him off, then offer to sell him pot for two dollars a gram.

Mr. Officer would walk off with ten grams of actually broccoli.

Tanner was a damn genius, and the complete opposite regarding common sense.

But now, he was sitting before me, his shirt covered in blood and his face grimy and his eyes absent of pupils gleaming an unearthly shade.

This wasn't the Tanner I knew.

"Remember what Rorres always told us when we were children?"

I had half a mind to start beating the broken bottle into Tanner's skull. Here we were, sitting in utter fear and confusion, and he was bringing up the old man who used to live a few blocks down from us.

Rorres was a 70-year-old with a long braided beard and no hair on top his head. He always invited us children inside for cake or doughnuts, and told us stories that we never took seriously. An acid addict wouldn't be stupid enough to take his stories seriously: they consisted of another world, another dimension altogether. Stories that told of elves, and dwarves, and a load of other shit that I read in books back when I actually read. Rorres acted as if they were real, his mouth full of crooked teeth smiling as he "recalled" each story.

As children, we thought the stories were real. We pretended to be archers and warriors and wandered the forests as children of the earth. But it was hard to be so positive in our games when each and every one of us was either poor, unwanted, or both.

Sadly, Rorres was taken away by the local police for untold reasons. We found his house all boarded up and the note on the door had the ugly caution tape and "Under Investigation" in red, sloppy letters on it and there wasn't anything else written on it. I got yelled at for asking, as did everyone else.

The backstories I etched out for both Tanner and John weren't pleasant.

And neither was mine, honestly.

As a stranger in my own home, I didn't understand what it was like to love one's family. Both my parents treated me indifferently, always looking puzzled when I tried to do anything nice for them and always screaming at me if I brought up Rorres's stories.

Father worked for a massive company and spent hundreds of dollars on expensive dinners and gaudy parties and Europe trips and overpriced alcohol. He was extremely dignified and never bothered casting a single look in my direction, considering me the "problem child". He constantly compared me to my sister Beth and picked at my insecurities constantly. Whenever medical bills were involved with me he'd begrudgingly pay for it while muttering about me being "accident prone" and clumsy.

My sister Beth was adored in the house by literally everyone and anyone. She was pleasant and quirky, and always beamed with her blonde locks and gray eyes and slightly bronzed skin. Her tone was slim, and she wore everything and anything expensive or classy. Not a foul word ever escaped her red lips, and she was always so proper, charming anyone she met. All the guests invited to our house died to see her: I stopped coming outside my room when guests were at home, after one made a snarky comment about me being the least attractive relative in the family. I wore makeup for a reason.

I couldn't help how I looked nothing like the family: I preferred gloomy shades and pale skin and didn't appreciate normality in the slightest bit. I drew black lines on my eyes and frightened the hell out of everyone with my purple irises. My cheeks turned a deep red when I was angry and my eyes shifted colors for the same reason. I clumped around in combat boots and couldn't keep a pair of stockings without holes in them. I had four tattoos, none of which were approved by the family, and had my nose and lip pierced. My parents "said" they'd disown me if I got gauges:I did it anyway, still remained with a home.

I beat every and any kid that angered me in the neighborhood and poked holes in tires and threw smoke bombs at cops.

I climbed fences and threw bricks through the windows of my school.

I staged riots at corners and I did everything and anything I could without getting caught, and enjoyed every second of it.

Even with the holes in my face and my trashy style, Beth said she loved me. She was two years older, and spent time with me when my parents weren't home. She'd buy me new plugs and shared her makeup with me and gave me money to buy what I wanted, and she always told me she'd help us move out one day, away from home. My parents would scold her if they saw her spending time with me, the outcast child. She supported me in everything, and loved to listen to Rorres's stories as much as I did.

She was gone too, which was why Tanner and I were at home by ourselves… until now.

"Listen to me, Hannah.

We're going to use Rorres stories.

And we're going to see if they're true."

The chatter outside was getting louder.

"Tanner, you're out of it."

"No I'm not, please—"

"OPEN UP."

The police were outside my bedroom door, beating on it.

I started panicking. "Tanner, tell me what's going on!"

"I will after we escape."

Tanner took his finger and began drawing on the carpet… and black, swarming letters formed. His eyes were completely globes of green now, veins bulging out of his arms. Vague whispering gathered in volume around us as the letters fused to form a tunnel in the floor. It swirled in a faded shade of purple, the edges creeping towards the walls. It was the size of a small pond now. I backed away from it, wide eyed and terrified.

Tanner took my arm. "Do you trust me?"

I hesitated, then nodded vigorously while staring at the tunnel.

"C'mon then."

He pushed me in, jumping in after me just as the door was smashed open.

I couldn't feel any pain, but I couldn't see anything either. My hands couldn't feel anything solid as I fell farther and farther down the abyss, with no light at the end of the tunnel. I couldn't figure out which way was up, or if I was dreaming.

I begged to wake up, to wake up to everything normal again, to my friends being safe.

Not particularly sure how Alice in Wonderland dealt with falling down an acid trip.

My screaming cut to a halt as I became immersed in water.

I floundered back to the top, gasping and cursing any name that came to mind.

"Sorry. I know you don't like water." Tanner was sitting cross legged before me, completely drenched and looking awfully sheepish. His eyes were normal, and he looked like Tanner again.

"I don't like YOU either, asshole." I seethed, crawling out of the water. "Explain to me what sort of magic you just performed."

"Remember Rorres's stories?"

"There you go again about Rorres."

"I was right, you now realize. You were always the stubborn one, out of all the children." the voice wasn't Tanner's.

I snapped my vision upwards to find old man Rorres standing before me and Tanner. He was clad in some brown cloak, a wooden staff clenched in his right hand.

"RORRES?"

"Lovely to see you too, children. Come with me, there isn't much time. I'll explain later." He rushed off, clumping his stick along with him.

Tanner helped me out of the water and we followed hurriedly after him.

"RORRES. DO ME A FAVOR AND EXPLAIN!"

"Later, child."

I was getting aggravated at this little old man, darting in this tunnel and that tunnel and unlocking door after door with the clump of keys on his belt. I just hoped he knew where the hell he was going.

"Where have you been for ten years?!"

"Jail for two, Ashenvale for seven years and 11 months and 12 days, and this cave for 18 days. Been trying to get you children to Ashenvale as quickly as possible, the chimes are turning, please allow later for me to explain."

"Don't you mean tables?"

"No. Chimes. They sound better than tables— oh I've always loved this door, it's got such a nice mahogany odor to it. Let's see… bronze key, then that key, then the little purple one… got it!" He scrambled into the door and cackled as he ran.

Tanner cast me a side glance and laughed at my bewilderment.

"How much did we drink again?"

"Oh damn both of you, you both have started drinking? Good gods… children these days, smoking chimneys and drinking vinegar. Didn't I tell each of you about— oh here we are." Rorres brought us to a door completely made of coal, it appeared, a red line running from the top to the bottom. He took his staff and ignited the middle of the door, the line bursting into flame before the door opened.

I was panting from running so much. Cold, too, from the midnight dousing. I was terribly hungry to add on to the misery and I wasn't getting dry in the humid tunnels. I clung like a lost pup to Tanner, almost in tears. First my friends' disappearance, then this? A seemingly wild goose chase with absolutely no answers to my questions? I continuously wondered when I'd wake up hungover next to Tanner.

Rorres suddenly stopped running, coming to a halt.

"Hannah. I know you're horribly confused, and probably very, very angry, but stay strong. You'll see everyone again, don't you worry your pretty head. We only have seven more doors to unlock and then we'll be near Ashenvale and then I'll allow Denarius to take both of you on the caravan."

"But… Rorres. Ashenvale… Elves?"

"Yes. The night elves, thought you'd remember my stories."

"THEY'RE REAL."

"YES, CHILD. Goodness how did you even pass school… oh wait you didn't, pardon my mistake—"

I proceeded to knock my head into the nearest wall. Nothing occurred. "The Night Elves. Dwarves. Orcs. High Elves—"

"They're Blood Elves now, sweetheart."

"…right. Forgot about the Sunwell."

"And they're REBUILDING it, would you imagine… You'll hopefully have a hand in keeping them from doing something stupid with it if they get permitted to build the damn thing…"

"Why are we going to Ashenvale?"

"Because it's fate, love. I'm not fully human. I'm half elven.

I came to your world to find each of you, and bring you here to fulfill the scrolls. You're going to fight for a world that you'll soon call home, believe me or not. You'll be at the sides of the heroes I told you about, and many more that you'll meet yourselves."

"Training…?" I asked.

"Yes. Training. And fate itself will unravel whether or not you perform good in the years to come. I cannot prophesy any of that at this time, reason being I'm not one of the gods and it's way too hard to see the damn clouds in this hole… Oh how I miss the clouds, they're so nice in the evening…

"But before we continue…"

Rorres pulled down his hood and finally showed me his face. His eyes gleamed silver, his ears distinctly pointed. The veins on his arms flared blue and red, and his hands were coated with a swirling substance. His staff shared the glowing veins on his arms, the sphere at its point seemingly collecting energy from the ground we stood upon. "Now that you've seen it, come on. We have much to do."

I continued following without a word, almost breathless in anxiety and realization.

"Please don't faint upon seeing what you're about to see, John did."

"Wait what—"

Rorres slammed the door One: Farewell Love

Stop here if you're a little shit.

And put down this damn book if you're not ready for feels.

-Intro

Perhaps it's the goal of people to be noticed; to be someone important. Someone that everyone greets with a placid smile and a glimmer of notice in their eyes. A breathing being that everyone will miss, should they disappear. One does envy the most popular of these folk: humans that light up the entire room when they enter, clad in happiness and reeking of positivity. Magic almost erupts from every word they speak, fooling anyone and everyone they meet. Anyone they speak to just about keels over in feigned gratitude, almost willing to worship them.

Damn those kinds of people, regardless of their intentions.

I never could comprehend nor appreciate positivity, since it never decided to don its grace upon my own life. No, I don't intend upon spending word after word on negative statements, or creating a "woe is me, and woe betide you" sort of novel. However I don't intend to tickle your ears with insincere gaiety. Reality is preferred to my own costs, reason being that one is allowed to murder everyone with reality.

Welcome, you've found hell.

Enjoy your fucking stay.

Chapter One: Blood & Insomnia

5:23 AM

"You should sleep."

"Shut up."

I crumpled another can and sent it aloft into a trash can.

"Not sleeping isn't going to bring them back…"

"Not sleeping will keep my head from trying to murder me."

I sat with my back to the wall, the window before me melting with rain.

My friend Tanner cleared aside his curly wreck of hair from his face and sighed. He joined me in watching the window, crossing his lanky legs as he sat. Two emerald irises adorned his face and glinted at the rain. He reeked of alcohol and laundry soap.

He entertained himself with picking at the holes in my jeans, not knowing what else to say. On other days he'd hug me close; today wasn't when I'd appreciate it.

Of course I wouldn't appreciate it: every single one of my damn friends had disappeared off the face of the fucking planet. No, they hadn't died, although I would've appreciated it more if I could see their lifeless bodies as opposed to knowing they were alive and no one knew where they were in this God-forsaken town. I would've much rather have been weeping over their deaths than ripping my conscience apart trying to figure out where they could've gone. The poorest kids in this town could not have possibly gone far. Unless they actually hitched a ride to the city and scrabbled up money for a train.

My friend sighed again, a little more aggravated than ten minutes ago. "Hannah."

"What"

"Let it go. They'll come back."

The back of my hand whipped across his face. He fell over and didn't move for a bit, slightly stunned.

"Shut up." I seethed

"Okay."

He rubbed the side of his face and stayed silent next to me.

Maybe it's stupid to be so stricken with their disappearance, but after spending all the life i remember with them… It meant much to me. They had helped me through so much and we were just a big crew of teenagers, all five of us, known mainly for being the poorest kids in this lot and being the raunchiest regarding behavior.

Tanner was one of those friends, being the only one still there. He was nineteen, and used to be one of the twenty children at the orphanage down the street. He was a genius, finished high school at fifteen, and moved in with Serena's family. She was gone too. Tanner had come over to my house earlier to avoid speaking with the police whom were searching Serena's room for any evidence of her disappearance. Not to mention he had also come over to drink himself sick.

My family never regulated who took the alcohol.

He took another swig of Vodka and giggled for a minute before staggering over to the bathroom.

I couldn't help but chuckle as he dumped his entire stomach into the toilet, cursing profusely between puking. I took a drink for myself, finishing the bottle before throwing it out the open window. The shattering of glass on the pavement outside was satisfying.

Tanner stumbled back next to me, hanging his head. "I want her back."

"i know you do. Shut it." I mumbled, popping open another bottle of alcohol.

"What's that?"

"Gin."

"Hand it this way."

He took the bottle from me and started downing it almost as quickly as I opened it.

I took it away from him when it was half empty. "You'll drink yourself to death, stupid."

"That's the point." He laughed, flopping over on his side like a deranged fish. "Sleeping here tonight."

"Do what you want." I yawned, "No sleep for me."

I poured the alcohol into a paper cup and downed it.

I gasped at how dizzy I became, keeling over next to Tanner and giving in to sleep.

I had insomnia for a reason.

Images of utter horror filled my mind, my conscience falling into deep sleep.

I found myself in a massive field. It was familiar to me.

I looked around blankly, shaking and shivering in abstinence of anything protecting me.

"Hannah!"

I wheeled around to find John, the shortest fellow of our crew. He was waving frantically, his clothes torn and his flesh no different underneath. His face bore the look of terror and his eyes kept darting around as if he was being chased.

Oh John. Johnny John. Asshole John. The little rascal of the group, with a heart of gold and a hot temper to match his fiery hair. Yellow spheres adorned his face for eyes, glittering like amber. He had given up trying to grow any taller than five feet, and was well known by the local police due to his constant thievery from the convenient stores. They never caught him, the boy was far too fast and too nimble. One could blink and he'd be gone, whether it be up a tree or down some gutter hole. No one could blame him for stealing: he had no parents and the ones who adopted him dumped him a week later saying he was stupid and they had no use for him. He refused to go to the orphanage and never got along with school. John couldn't stay in a seat longer than ten minutes before blowing something up into flames. Don't ask me how he did it. Being an arson seemed to dwell in his blood.

I ended up teaching him how to read and how to do simple math. He had a habit of keeping bags of pennies and nickels in his cardboard box that he lived in and didn't realize he had 1,112 dollars in coins and 64 cents until i taught him to count. He proceeded to spend it on pizza and alcohol for the next month.

Getting dumped on the streets was how we found him, huddled up on a cold corner dressed in a flurry of curses and ragged clothes. We tried keeping him in the basement of my house, but my "family" said they wouldn't have a "thief" in the house and threatened to call child support or some shit. We still kept him in our crew though; we gave him old clothes and we gave him food when we could. He stole when we couldn't provide him any, and would confess his sins at the local Catholic church every Saturday if he felt bad enough.

To sum it all up, boy had absolutely no fear, darting this way and that every chance we saw him.

But I'd never seen him like this, drenched with angst and bleeding like a gut pig.

"Hannah follow me! There's no time!" he whimpered, skittering away as blood dripped from his clothes.

I staggered after him as he fled into deep cave. I couldn't see a thing, but I knew that the ground was beneath my feet. Nothing more than that.

A door shut abruptly behind me.

"JOHN?"

No answer.

"JOHN. DON'T DO THIS. WHERE THE HELL ARE—"

"AWH WHAT A SWEETIE" Laughing erupted from all sides of the cave.

My stomach twisted itself into a ragged knot and curvatured into my spine at the voice i heard. And it wasn't John's.

"…Your voice is awfully ragged, John." I managed to force words out of my throat.

The laughing continued, bouncing off the sides of the cave and slamming into my head.

I stood there dumbstruck, wondering if it would be wise to start running or to attempt escaping out the shut door.

I sweated and fidgeted in my clothes, my eyes shut tight and my hands clenched at my sides. The laughing was getting coarser and much more.. closer.

"That wasn't John, sweetie."

I forced my eyes open, looked upwards, and screamed.

John hung from the ceiling, a chain threaded in his throat and spurted out the back. Blood fountained out of a hole in his stomach, intestines flopped out and pale.

A hand clamped around my neck and dragged me backwards as I started screaming.

"JOHN"

"He can't hear you."

"WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO"

"He's trying to bring you with us."

I stopped thrashing, panting and pulling at the hand around my throat. "What—" i coughed, "What the hell do you mean?!"

No answer. Only the shuffling of feet answered.

"ANSWER ME, DAMMIT. MY FRIENDS, THEY'RE GONE, FOR FUCKS SAKE—"

"I know. They're with me. And everyone else. But you won't be joining them anytime soon if I can help it."

I was beyond confused, ceasing my struggling to try and decipher what the hell was going on. Of course I was dreaming, but… if hell was real, I was feeling it right then and there. I couldn't feel pain, nor fear. Just confusion and anger intermingled into one massive explosive emotion. "FUCK YOU." I started up my screaming again, "WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY"

"You'll die if you try to find out. Stay home. Stay where people love you." The voice was blunt, but almost touching. As if this creature cared, in the slightest way.

I pulled the hand off my neck and scrambled away. "TELL ME WHERE THEY ARE." I was screaming now, while staggering along the dark flat. "WHY WOULD YOU KILL MY LITTLE BROTHER, HE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING." I was ready to cry over John's death. The sight of his body mangled and torn into utter shreds refused to exit my mind. Just a day ago I had seen him alive and kicking, fleeing down a street with a bag of stolen bread and throwing marbles behind him to hinder the cops chasing him. Just a day ago he sat next to me and drank himself sick before curling up in my arms and crying like a little child over our lost friends. Then he was gone too, without a word or a wisp.

"I didn't kill him. He's alive."

"You're not a very good liar you whore." I seethed, scooting away from him.

The creature speaking was male, I could tell that much. And extremely large. Breaths heaved out of his chest and two green globes glimmered where I assumed his face was. Claws of ivory dug into my throat as he clenched tighter, my struggles futile.

"i'll explain but I don't think you'll understand." he grumped. "I killed his presence. Not his body. They're both different. This isn't reality, sweetheart. This is your mind. Everyone has one. They all have something in common.. and it's that we all can live and die in them. In theory, anyway. I could kill you right now but you'd wake up back home perfectly well and whole."

I didn't care what his words meant, at the time. I didn't understand what he was talking about and I was yet confused and growing increasingly heartbroken over the loss of my little friend.

"..I don't understand.." I croaked, my voice blown out from screaming.

"..what else don't you understand, little one?"

"Where have my friends gone..? I need them back.."

He was silent.

I started sobbing like a little child, my face buried in my knees. "You don't understand.. I need my friends back.. I don't have a family, they're all I have.."

"You'll see them again, love. See you soon."

I suddenly awoke to Tanner shaking me.

"Hannah. Something's not right here."

"You're drunk. Go back to sleep."

"No! Hannah, shut up and listen— I just saw John."

I pushed him away. "Yeah, I did too. I don't know what the fuck—"

"Shh." Tanner suddenly covered my mouth with his hand. "Hear that?"

I looked around momentarily. "I don't— wait."

There was a light flutter of chatter outside the house, near the front door. Tanner was in a pounce-ready position, his neck bulging with veins. I'd never seen him like this before. His hair was plastered against his neck, his shirt torn and his breaths heavy, as if had been running. The bottle we drank out of earlier was smashed and covered in… blood?

"Tanner… what the hell did you do?"

"Saved our lives. Don't ask, just listen very carefully as to what I'm about to tell you. We don't have much time, and we have to act quickly."

I blinked and stared blankly at him, wondering how drunk we both were.

Tanner was indeed smart, and intelligent, but he rarely was as serious as he was at this very moment. He always hopped from job to job after getting bored, and would create quadratic equilibriums worth millions of dollars for absolutely no reason. He was always the fellow joking about how he'd be living in a cardboard box if he didn't get his life together, wearing jeans with holes as big as the Grand Canyon and flannels that hadn't been washed in a week and refusing to cut his unruly mass of hair. He'd smoke a joint in front of a cop just to piss him off, then offer to sell him pot for two dollars a gram.

Mr. Officer would walk off with ten grams of actually broccoli.

Tanner was a damn genius, and the complete opposite regarding common sense.

But now, he was sitting before me, his shirt covered in blood and his face grimy and his eyes absent of pupils gleaming an unearthly shade.

This wasn't the Tanner I knew.

"Remember what Rorres always told us when we were children?"

I had half a mind to start beating the broken bottle into Tanner's skull. Here we were, sitting in utter fear and confusion, and he was bringing up the old man who used to live a few blocks down from us.

Rorres was a 70-year-old with a long braided beard and no hair on top his head. He always invited us children inside for cake or doughnuts, and told us stories that we never took seriously. An acid addict wouldn't be stupid enough to take his stories seriously: they consisted of another world, another dimension altogether. Stories that told of elves, and dwarves, and a load of other shit that I read in books back when I actually read. Rorres acted as if they were real, his mouth full of crooked teeth smiling as he "recalled" each story.

As children, we thought the stories were real. We pretended to be archers and warriors and wandered the forests as children of the earth. But it was hard to be so positive in our games when each and every one of us was either poor, unwanted, or both.

Sadly, Rorres was taken away by the local police for untold reasons. We found his house all boarded up and the note on the door had the ugly caution tape and "Under Investigation" in red, sloppy letters on it and there wasn't anything else written on it. I got yelled at for asking, as did everyone else.

The backstories I etched out for both Tanner and John weren't pleasant.

And neither was mine, honestly.

As a stranger in my own home, I didn't understand what it was like to love one's family. Both my parents treated me indifferently, always looking puzzled when I tried to do anything nice for them and always screaming at me if I brought up Rorres's stories.

Father worked for a massive company and spent hundreds of dollars on expensive dinners and gaudy parties and Europe trips and overpriced alcohol. He was extremely dignified and never bothered casting a single look in my direction, considering me the "problem child". He constantly compared me to my sister Beth and picked at my insecurities constantly. Whenever medical bills were involved with me he'd begrudgingly pay for it while muttering about me being "accident prone" and clumsy.

My sister Beth was adored in the house by literally everyone and anyone. She was pleasant and quirky, and always beamed with her blonde locks and gray eyes and slightly bronzed skin. Her tone was slim, and she wore everything and anything expensive or classy. Not a foul word ever escaped her red lips, and she was always so proper, charming anyone she met. All the guests invited to our house died to see her: I stopped coming outside my room when guests were at home, after one made a snarky comment about me being the least attractive relative in the family. I wore makeup for a reason.

I couldn't help how I looked nothing like the family: I preferred gloomy shades and pale skin and didn't appreciate normality in the slightest bit. I drew black lines on my eyes and frightened the hell out of everyone with my purple irises. My cheeks turned a deep red when I was angry and my eyes shifted colors for the same reason. I clumped around in combat boots and couldn't keep a pair of stockings without holes in them. I had four tattoos, none of which were approved by the family, and had my nose and lip pierced. My parents "said" they'd disown me if I got gauges:I did it anyway, still remained with a home.

I beat every and any kid that angered me in the neighborhood and poked holes in tires and threw smoke bombs at cops.

I climbed fences and threw bricks through the windows of my school.

I staged riots at corners and I did everything and anything I could without getting caught, and enjoyed every second of it.

Even with the holes in my face and my trashy style, Beth said she loved me. She was two years older, and spent time with me when my parents weren't home. She'd buy me new plugs and shared her makeup with me and gave me money to buy what I wanted, and she always told me she'd help us move out one day, away from home. My parents would scold her if they saw her spending time with me, the outcast child. She supported me in everything, and loved to listen to Rorres's stories as much as I did.

She was gone too, which was why Tanner and I were at home by ourselves… until now.

"Listen to me, Hannah.

We're going to use Rorres stories.

And we're going to see if they're true."

The chatter outside was getting louder.

"Tanner, you're out of it."

"No I'm not, please—"

"OPEN UP."

The police were outside my bedroom door, beating on it.

I started panicking. "Tanner, tell me what's going on!"

"I will after we escape."

Tanner took his finger and began drawing on the carpet… and black, swarming letters formed. His eyes were completely globes of green now, veins bulging out of his arms. Vague whispering gathered in volume around us as the letters fused to form a tunnel in the floor. It swirled in a faded shade of purple, the edges creeping towards the walls. It was the size of a small pond now. I backed away from it, wide eyed and terrified.

Tanner took my arm. "Do you trust me?"

I hesitated, then nodded vigorously while staring at the tunnel.

"C'mon then."

He pushed me in, jumping in after me just as the door was smashed open.

I couldn't feel any pain, but I couldn't see anything either. My hands couldn't feel anything solid as I fell farther and farther down the abyss, with no light at the end of the tunnel. I couldn't figure out which way was up, or if I was dreaming.

I begged to wake up, to wake up to everything normal again, to my friends being safe.

Not particularly sure how Alice in Wonderland dealt with falling down an acid trip.

My screaming cut to a halt as I became immersed in water.

I floundered back to the top, gasping and cursing any name that came to mind.

"Sorry. I know you don't like water." Tanner was sitting cross legged before me, completely drenched and looking awfully sheepish. His eyes were normal, and he looked like Tanner again.

"I don't like YOU either, asshole." I seethed, crawling out of the water. "Explain to me what sort of magic you just performed."

"Remember Rorres's stories?"

"There you go again about Rorres."

"I was right, you now realize. You were always the stubborn one, out of all the children." the voice wasn't Tanner's.

I snapped my vision upwards to find old man Rorres standing before me and Tanner. He was clad in some brown cloak, a wooden staff clenched in his right hand.

"RORRES?"

"Lovely to see you too, children. Come with me, there isn't much time. I'll explain later." He rushed off, clumping his stick along with him.

Tanner helped me out of the water and we followed hurriedly after him.

"RORRES. DO ME A FAVOR AND EXPLAIN!"

"Later, child."

I was getting aggravated at this little old man, darting in this tunnel and that tunnel and unlocking door after door with the clump of keys on his belt. I just hoped he knew where the hell he was going.

"Where have you been for ten years?!"

"Jail for two, Ashenvale for seven years and 11 months and 12 days, and this cave for 18 days. Been trying to get you children to Ashenvale as quickly as possible, the chimes are turning, please allow later for me to explain."

"Don't you mean tables?"

"No. Chimes. They sound better than tables— oh I've always loved this door, it's got such a nice mahogany odor to it. Let's see… bronze key, then that key, then the little purple one… got it!" He scrambled into the door and cackled as he ran.

Tanner cast me a side glance and laughed at my bewilderment.

"How much did we drink again?"

"Oh damn both of you, you both have started drinking? Good gods… children these days, smoking chimneys and drinking vinegar. Didn't I tell each of you about— oh here we are." Rorres brought us to a door completely made of coal, it appeared, a red line running from the top to the bottom. He took his staff and ignited the middle of the door, the line bursting into flame before the door opened.

I was panting from running so much. Cold, too, from the midnight dousing. I was terribly hungry to add on to the misery and I wasn't getting dry in the humid tunnels. I clung like a lost pup to Tanner, almost in tears. First my friends' disappearance, then this? A seemingly wild goose chase with absolutely no answers to my questions? I continuously wondered when I'd wake up hungover next to Tanner.

Rorres suddenly stopped running, coming to a halt.

"Hannah. I know you're horribly confused, and probably very, very angry, but stay strong. You'll see everyone again, don't you worry your pretty head. We only have seven more doors to unlock and then we'll be near Ashenvale and then I'll allow Denarius to take both of you on the caravan."

"But… Rorres. Ashenvale… Elves?"

"Yes. The night elves, thought you'd remember my stories."

"THEY'RE REAL."

"YES, CHILD. Goodness how did you even pass school… oh wait you didn't, pardon my mistake—"

I proceeded to knock my head into the nearest wall. Nothing occurred. "The Night Elves. Dwarves. Orcs. High Elves—"

"They're Blood Elves now, sweetheart."

"…right. Forgot about the Sunwell."

"And they're REBUILDING it, would you imagine… You'll hopefully have a hand in keeping them from doing something stupid with it if they get permitted to build the damn thing…"

"Why are we going to Ashenvale?"

"Because it's fate, love. I'm not fully human. I'm half elven.

I came to your world to find each of you, and bring you here to fulfill the scrolls. You're going to fight for a world that you'll soon call home, believe me or not. You'll be at the sides of the heroes I told you about, and many more that you'll meet yourselves."

"Training…?" I asked.

"Yes. Training. And fate itself will unravel whether or not you perform good in the years to come. I cannot prophesy any of that at this time, reason being I'm not one of the gods and it's way too hard to see the damn clouds in this hole… Oh how I miss the clouds, they're so nice in the evening…

"But before we continue…"

Rorres pulled down his hood and finally showed me his face. His eyes gleamed silver, his ears distinctly pointed. The veins on his arms flared blue and red, and his hands were coated with a swirling substance. His staff shared the glowing veins on his arms, the sphere at its point seemingly collecting energy from the ground we stood upon. "Now that you've seen it, come on. We have much to do."

I continued following without a word, almost breathless in anxiety and realization.

"Please don't faint upon seeing what you're about to see, John did."

"Wait what—"

Rorres slammed the door open.


End file.
